This past weekend I decided to sign up for the Metroplex Sprint Triathlon taking place at Joe Pool Lake in Grand Prairie. Since I have been training now for about five weeks I had kind of hit a rut so I figured this short race would be fun to see how my training has improved my overall fitness level. the race consisted on a 400m open water lake swim, 11 mile bike ride, and a 2 mile run. These short sprint races are a lot of fun because your approach is totally different from the longer half or full Ironman distances. You basically go all out the entire race and there is really no "pace" involved. We loaded up the entire family (Vanessa, Elle, and Carol-mother-in-law) at 5AM and headed to Grand Prairie. My two year old Elle was all excited as we even brought her bike because she wanted to race! She loves to run with me and ride her bike. I think she may be a little triathlete here in a few years. Anyway, this race was a very small local race so only about 175 people took place in it. I would say that about 30% of the entire group was doing there first triathlon at this race. This is real cool to see and meet these folks as I remember just two short years ago when I did my first race. The entire atmosphere is great and the nerves that fill your body are overwhelming. I went off in the first group as they combined 2-3 age groups and started them together. Since this was an open-water swim, it usually is a little more intimidating and difficult for the beginners so I thought I would try to position myself upfront at the start since swimming is my best event. I kissed Vanessa and Elle and entered the water with the other 40 or so people in my wave. The gun went off and just how I expected, most all the men in the water raced as hard as they could for the first 100 meters. I knew that I was one of the better swimmers out there so I let these guys pass me in the beginning. After we rounded the first buoy, it was only a matter of time before I started to catch up to the 10 or so folks in from of me. By the time we were half way I had made my way to the front of the pack pushing myself pretty hard. As I rounded the last buoy for the home stretch I was really breathing pretty hard but only had about 50 meters to go so I gave it one last push. As I exited the water I was right behind the eventual race winner (more on him in a bit) and we raced toward transition to get our bikes. I was pretty winded as the rest of the group was a good 20 meters behind us still in the water. The bike portion of the race was short at 11 miles. This was good for me because I could really push myself to see if I have made improvements with my training. I had spent the majority of my Ironman training up to now on my bike trying to improve in that area as this is my least favorite event. During the race, I did get past by two or three others but I was happy with my speed as I averaged around 22 mph over the 11 miles. This is by no means is fast but a lot fast than the 16-17 mph that I used to average just a few months back. I was very pleased as I came off the bike into transition ready to start the run. As for the guy who got out of the water before me, he just happened to be the U.S. National Champion at this Sprint distance, and it showed on the bike and run. I just saw a flash of him on the course as he flew around on the bike at around 26 mph and average at 5:30 min mile run. Hey, at least I hung with him on the swim, right? As I got into the short run course I felt good for the most part. I was not tired but I had had a little too much Gatorade on the bike as well as a GU Gel so my stomach was not in good shape. This made me hold back a little on the short run but I still finished strong with a 7:10 min/mile pace on the run. My new Altra Instinct shoe http://www.altrarunning.com/, felt great and I think they have really helped me out. I finished good enough for 4th place in my group. I was very pleased with my results and I accomplished what I wanted to by signing up. It gave me a good boost to my training this week and also made me realized how far I have come. It also made me realize how much further I need to go to get where I need to be for Kona. Oh yeah, Elle and I did get in a short race afterward as she entertained the finishers with her blazing speed!
On a side note, congrats to those Dallas Mavericks! They won the NBA title this past Sunday and are World Champions after nobody gave them a chance. Way to go Mavs!
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